HARPERS 


Beginning  in  this  issue 

STEPHEN  LEACOCK'S 

New    Nonsense    Novels 

PHILIP   GIBBS 

Ideals  and  Disillusions 

ROBERT  FROST 

A  New  Group  of  Poems 

By  the  author  of 
"North  of  Boston" 

In  the  Sacred  City 
of  Buddha 

By  ROY  CHAPMAN  ANDREWS 
Price  40 


ESTEY  PIANOS 


New   Art  Catalog  on   Request 
ESTEY  PIANO  COMPANY 

NEW  YORK 

RETAIL  SHOWROOMS :    THE  WELTE  STUDIOS 
665     FIFTH     AVENUE.     NEW     YORK 


Harper's  Magazine :  Published  Monthly ;  40  cents  a  copy,  $4.00  a,  Year.  Harper  &•  Brothers,  Publishers,  New  York 
(Entered  as  second-class  matter,  March  7, 1913,  at  the  post  office  at  New  York,  N.Y.,  under  the  act  of  March  3, 1879.  Serial  No.  842) 
JULY.  1920 


HARPE  R'S     M  AGAZIN  E 


JULY  1920 

Frontispiece  in  Color F.  WALTER  TAYLOR 

Urga,  The  Sacred  City  of  the  Living  Buddha  ROY  CHAPMAN  ANDREWS    .     .     .  145 

Illustrated  with  Photographs 

The  Rotter.     A  Story FLETA  CAMPBELL  SPRINGER    .     .  157 

Illustrations  by  T.  K.  HANNA 

Ideals  and  Disillusions PHILIP  GIBBS 175 

A  Village  Portrait.  A  Poem  ....  MARGARET  STEEL  HARD  .  .  .  186 

.  .  .187 
A  Group  of  Poems ROBERT  FROST 196 

.  .  .200 
Tempering  Justice  with  Common  Sense  .  .  THEODORE  MACFARLANE  KNAPPEN  21 1 


New  Nonsense  Novels STEPHEN  LEACOCK 

I. — "  Winsome  Winnie  " 


The  Beauty  and  the  Bolshevist.  A  Story.  Part  III  ALICE  DUER  MILLER 

Illustrations  in  Tint  by  R.  M.  CROSBY 


The  Miracle.     A  Story BETH  BRADFORD  GILCHRIST     .     .217 

Illustrations  by  E.  L.  CHASE 

America  Goes  Back  to  Work.     Part  III.     EDWARD  HUNGERFORD   ....  231 

Illustrated  with  Photographs 

Wisdom.     A  Poem MARGARET  WIDDEMER    ....  243 

.     .     .244 

The  Sore  Spot  of  Europe ARTHUR  BULLARD 256 

Sharer.     A  Poem EDITH  M.  THOMAS 264 

.  265 


Decline  and  Fall.     A  Story HOWARD  BRUBAKER 

Illustrations  by  R.  McNsiL  CRAMPTON 


W.    D.    Howells EDWARD    S.    MARTIN    .... 

With  Portrait 

The  Lion's  Mouth 267 

"A  Doctor  of  Literature,"  by  C.  A.  Bennett — "Ballad  at  Twenty-three,"  by  Irwin  Edman — "The 
Woman  Alone." 

Editor's  Drawer 273 

"Still  Waters,"  by  Malcolm  La  Prade;  illustrated  by  the  author.   "  Ballade  of  Life's  Dream,"  by  Rich- 
ard Le  Callienne.     Drawings  by  Chester  I.  Garde,  R.  B.  Fuller. 

Business  and  Financial  Cond'tions  .  JOHN  GRANT  DATER 


HARPER'S  MAGAZINE:  Published  Monthly;  40 
cents  a  copy,  $j.oo  a  Year.  Issue  of  July,  IQ.ZO.  Serial 
number.  842. 

Harper  &•  Brothers,  Franklin  Square,  New  York,  N.  Y.; 
Clinton  T.  Brainard,  President  and  Treasurer,  Franklin 


Square,  New  York.  N.  Y. ;  Henry  Hoyns,  Vice-President, 
Franklin  Square,  New  York,  N.Y.;  Thomas  B.  Wells,  Vice- 
President  and  Secretary,  Franklin  Square,  New  York,  N.  Y. 
Entered  as  second-class  matter,  March  7,  1013,  at  the  post 
office  at  New  York,  N.  Y.,  under  the  Act  of  March  3,  1879. 


Printed  in  the  United  States  of  America 


A    GROUP    OF    POEMS 


BY    ROBERT    FROST 


After  being  almost  unheard  for  two  years,  Robert  Frost  is  speaking  again,  in 
the  old  strain  that  mil  be  unmistakable  to  readers  of  his  "  North  of  Boston."  But 
Mr.  Frost  has  not  really  been  silent  during  this  period.  He  has  been  producing 
more  work  of  the  type  that  has  made  him  regarded  on  both  sides  of  the  ocean  as 
one  of  the  authentic  voices  of  American  literature.  In  the  group  of  new  poems 
which  he  here  presents  the  broad  range  of  his  work  is  represented — as  Mr.  Frost 
himself  puts  it,  "  big  bear,  little  bear,  and  middle-sized  bear." 


FRAGMENTARY    BLUE 

WHY  make  so  much  of  fragmentary  blue 
In  here  and  there  a  bird  or  butterfly, 
Or  flower,  or  wearing-stone,  or  open  eye, 
When  heaven  presents  in  sheets  the  solid  hue? 


Since  earth  is  earth,  perhaps,  not  heaven  (as  yet) — 
Though  some  savants  make  earth  include  the  sky, 
And  blue  so  far  above  us  comes  so  high, 

It  only  gives  our  wish  for  blue  a  whet. 


PLACE    FOR    A    THIRD 

NOTHING  to  say  to  all  those  marriages! 
She  had  made  three  herself  to  three  of  his. 
The  score  was  even  for  them,  three  to  three. 
But  come  to  die  she  found  she  cared  so  much: 
She  thought  of  children  in  a  burial  row; 
Three  children  in  a  burial  row  were  sad. 
One  man's  three  women  in  a  burial  row — 
Somehow  made  her  impatient  with  the  man. 


A   GROUP  OF   POEMS  197 

And  so  she  said  to  Laban,  "You  have  done 

A  good  deal  right:   don't  do  the  last  thing  wrong. 

Don't  make  me  lie  with  those  two  other  women." 


Laban  said,  No,  he  would  not  make  her  lie 

With  any  one  but  that  she  had  a  mind  to. 

If  that  was  how  she  felt,  of  course,  he  said. 

She  went  her  way.     But  Laban  having  caught 

This  glimpse  of  lingering  person  in  Eliza, 

And  anxious  to  make  all  he  could  of  it 

With  something  he  remembered  in  himself., 

Tried  to  think  how  he  could  exceed  his  promise, 

And  give  good  measure  to  the  dead,  though  thankless. 

If  that  was  how  she  felt,  he  kept  repeating. 

His  first  thought  under  pressure  was  a  grave 

In  a  new  boughten  grave  plot  by  herself, 

Under  he  didn't  care  how  great  a  stone: 

He'd  sell  a  yoke  of  steers  to  pay  for  it. 

And  weren't  there  special  cemetery  flowers, 

That  once  grief  sets  to  growing,  grief  may  rest: 

The  flowers  will  go  on  with  grief  awhile, 

And  no  one  seem  neglecting  or  neglected? 

A  prudent  grief  will  not  despise  such  aids. 

He  thought  of  evergreen  and  everlasting. 

And  then  he  had  a  thought  worth  many  of  these. 

Somewhere  must  be  the  grave  of  the  young  boy 

Who  married  her  for  playmate  more  than  helpmate, 

And  sometimes  laughed  at  what  it  was  between  them. 

How  would  she  like  to  sleep  her  last  with  him? 

Where  was  his  grave?    Did  Laban  know  his  name? 


He  found  the  grave  a  town  or  two  away, 

The  headstone  cut  with  John,  Beloved  Husband, 

Beside  it  room  reserved,  the  say  a  sister's, 

A  never-married  sister's  of  that  husband, 

Whether  Eliza  would  be  welcome  there. 

The  dead  was  bound  to  silence:   ask  the  sister. 

So  Laban  saw  the  sister,  and,  saying  nothing 

Of  where  Eliza  wanted  not  to  lie, 

And  who  had  thought  to  lay  her  with  her  first  love, 

Begged  simply  for  the  grave.     The  sister's  face 

Fell  all  in  wrinkles  of  responsibility. 

She  wanted  to  do  right.     She'd  have  to  think. 


198  HARPER'S  MONTHLY  MAGAZINE 

Laban  was  old  and  poor,  yet  seemed  to  care; 
And  she  was  old  and  poor — but  she  cared,  too. 
They  sat.     She  cast  one  dull,  old  look  at  him, 
Then  turned  him  out  to  go  on  other  errands 
She  said  he  might  attend  to  in  the  village, 
While  she  made  up  her  mind  how  much  she  cared — 
And  how  much  Laban  cared — and  why  he  cared 
(She  made  shrewd  eyes  to  see  where  he  carne  in). 

She'd  looked  EKza  up  her  second  time, 

A  widow  at  her  second  husband's  grave, 

And  offered  her  a  home  to  rest  awhile 

Before  she  went  the  poor  man's  widow's  way, 

Housekeeping  for  the  next  man  out  of  wedlock. 

She  and  Eliza  had  been  friends  through  all. 

Who  was  she  to  judge  marriage  in  a  world 

Whose  Bible's  so  confused  up  in  marriage  counsel? 

The  sister  had  not  come  across  this  Laban; 

A  decent  product  of  life's  ironing-out; 

She  must  not  keep  him  waiting.    Time  would  press 

Between  the  death  day  and  the  funeral  day. 

So  when  she  saw  him  coming  in  the  street 

She  hurried  her  decision  to  be  ready 

To  meet  him  with  his  answer  at  the  door. 

Laban  had  known  about  what  it  would  be 

From  the  way  she  had  set  her  poor  old  mouth, 

To  do,  as  she  had  put  it,  what  was  right. 

She  gave  it  through  the  screen  door  closed  between  them: 
"No,  not  with  John.    There  wouldn't  be  no  sense. 
Eliza's  had  too  many  other  men." 

Laban  was  forced  to  fall  back  on  his  plan 
To  buy  Eliza  a  plot  to  lie  alone  in: 
Which  gives  him  for  himself  a  choice  of  lots 
When  his  time  comes  to  die  and  settle  down. 


GOOD-BY    AND    KEEP    COLD 

HIS  saying  good-by  on  the  edge  of  the  dark 
A  And  cold  to  an  orchard  so  young  in  the  bark 
Reminds  me  of  all  that  can  happen  to  harm 
An  orchard  away  at  the^end  of  the  farm 


A  GROUP  OF  POEMS  199 

All  winter,  cut  off  by  a  hill  from  the  house. 

I  don't  want  it  girdled  by  rabbit  and  mouse, 

I  don't  want  it  dreamily  nibbled  for  browse 

By  deer,  and  I  don't  want  it  budded  by  grouse. 

(If  certain  it  wouldn't  be  idle  to  call 

I'd  summon  grouse,  rabbit,  and  deer  to  the  wall 

And  warn  them  awray  with  a  stick  for  a  gun.) 

I  don't  want  it  stirred  by  the  heat  of  the  sun. 

(We  made  it  secure  against  being,  I  hope, 

By  setting  it  out  on  a  northerly  slope.) 

No  orchard's  the  worse  for  the  wintriest  storm; 

But  one  thing  about  it,  it  mustn't  get  warm. 

"How  often  already  you've  had  to  be  told, 

Keep  cold,  young  orchard.     Good-by  and  keep  cold. 

Dread  fifty  above  more  than  fifty  below." 

I  have  to  be  gone  for  a  season  or  so. 

My  business  awhile  is  with  different  trees, 

Less  carefully  nurtured,  less  fruitful  than  these, 

And  such  as  is  done  to  their  wood  with  an  ax — 

Maples  and  birches  and  tamaracks. 

I  wish  I  could  promise  to  lie  in  the  night 

And  think  of  an  orchard's  arboreal  plight 

When  slowly  (and  nobody  comes  with  a  light) 

Its  heart  sinks  lower  under  the  sod. 

But  something  has  to  be  left  to  God. 


FOR   ONCE,    THEN,    SOMETHING 

OTHERS  taunt  me  with  having  knelt  at  well-curbs 
Always  wrong  to  the  light,  so  never  seeing 
Deeper  down  in  the  well  than  where  the  water 
Gives  me  back  in  a  shining  surface  picture 
Me  myself  in  the  summer  heaven  godlike, 
Looking  out  of  a  wreath  of  fern  and  cloud  puffs. 
Once,  when  trying  with  chin  against  a  well-curb, 
I  discerned,  as  I  thought,  beyond  the  picture, 
Through  the  picture,  a  something  white,  uncertain, 
Something  more  of  the  depths — and  then  I  lost  it. 
Water  came  to  rebuke  the  too  clear  water. 
One  drop  fell  from  a  fern,  and  lo,  a  ripple 
Shook  whatever  it  was  lay  there  at  bottom, 
Blurred  it,  blotted  it  out.     What  was  that  whiteness? 
Truth?    A  pebble  of  quartz?    For  once,  then,  something. 


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